The Chord
by jayb3
Summary: A young Al Bhed woman washes up on the shore of Besaid after a brush with Sin. While on the lookout for her brother, she meets a summoner who offers to aid her on her journey. Prequel to FFX. T for language, alcohol, and some sexual theme.
1. Chapter 1

The rain whipped her cheeks and beat down on the ship deck as if it were a giant titanium drum. Gripping the slippery handrails, she attempted to look past the choppy waters for signs of human life but saw nothing- not that she could see farther than ten feet ahead in such brutal conditions, anyway. 'Where did this come from?', she wondered. The sky was crystal clear when they left only a few hours prior.

"Hana!" A voice boomed from inside the cabin, "What the fuck are you doing? Get inside!"

It was her brother.

"Do you have any better ideas, you wimp?" she shouted back, annoyed. She was far too stubborn to admit that her way wasn't exactly working, either.

Of course he didn't argue with her. After spending nineteen years with her, and sharing a womb in which she escaped two weeks early (dragging him along with her), he knew that it was futile. She was as hard as a rock and always had been. If you told her that the sky was blue, she'd insist that it was yellow if she were in the mood, and continue to insist so until the grave. Cid had no choice but to sigh under his breath and shake his head.

She shivered in her wetsuit and tried to brush her matted blonde hair out of her face with her forearm. The wind whistling in her ear became louder and louder as a massive wave splashed against the ship, soaking her. As she spit out a mouthful of seawater, a deep growl reverberated in the distance. Was it a fiend? Her imagination?

She thought that she might have heard Cid scream her name again, but she couldn't be sure. It didn't matter anyway, for the ship rocked so violently at this point that she would be thrown overboard if she were to let go. For the first time in her life, she yelped in fear.

She tried to look back to the cabin for her brother but the increased rage of the storm disoriented her. She screamed. There was no answer.

'It's because he's grabbing a rope, a lifesaver, anything', she told herself, although she only half believed it.

Another wave erupted from the water, but this time-this time it was different. It exploded perpendicular and exposed a scaly, wriggling skin.

Her malachite eyes grew as big as dinner plates. No, it couldn't be. No, no, no! This can't be happening! Why here? Why now? Has it really been ten years already?

The force of the beast catapulted her from the handrails and flung her across the ship like a ragdoll. She heard the horrible crunch of the back of her skull cracking as it struck against the deck. The ship heaved once more, and her limp body was tossed into the salty abyss.


	2. Chapter 2

She awoke with her head throbbing so intensely that she couldn't open her eyes. She leaned to her side and tried to spit out the salty water on the ground, but her throat was far too parched. Instead, she released a burning cough. She lifted her arm, which may as well have weighed a hundred pounds, and brushed her hand over the back of her head. To both her shock and relief, it was wrapped in cloth that was wet and sticky with what could only be blood. 'At least I'm alive', she thought.

She felt a breeze of fresh air and heard the billowing of curtains in the wind as a figure entered. A minute later, a cold cloth was dabbed on her eyes, cheeks, and forehead. She groaned.

"Oh, you're awake?" An old woman's voice cooed at her as she continued to dab her eyelids, "It's about time. Here, the cold water should help the swelling."

It took her a few moments to process what had been said to her, for it has been a long time since she's heard the common tongue. She said a silent prayer to whatever higher power existed that she was tutored in the language since she was six years old, despite the Al Bhed being "forbidden". Yevonites have no concept of free will, apparently.

"Where am I?" Hana croaked.

"Isle of Besaid," the old woman replied, "Found washed up on the beach after the Sin attack. Poor thing."

Oh, that's right. She cringed remembering the crunch of her skull and feeling the wet, sticky substance that soaked through her bandages. It was as if, even only for a flash, she relived it again. All the naseau, pain, and looking into the ugly face of death had caused her memory to become a little fuzzy. Be that as it may, she didn't hear rain or howling wind this time. Rather, it sounded peaceful outside, and hauntingly so.

Slowly and painfully, Hana forced open her eyes. She was in a purple tent that the sun infiltrated through, giving the space a lovely violet hue. Her wetsuit was neatly folded onto a wooden chair near the end of her cot. Panicking at the thought of being naked in front of strangers, she glanced down, saw the simple white cotton robe tightly wrapped around her, and let out an alleviating sigh.

She glanced over at the old woman across the tent while she unraveled fresh ribbons of cloth bandages with her ancient hands that looked as thin as tissue paper. The woman must have been less than five feet tall, although it was hard to tell when she was hunched over the table.

'Why is she helping me?' Hana thought, 'Doesn't she know what I am? The green eyes, blonde hair, and wetsuit surely would have given it away.' She nervously gnawed the inside of her cheek as an alternative to speaking out and inevitably ruining any chances that she might have at survival here.

The old woman chucked, "Don't worry, child. I know already. You're an Al Bhed."

Hana felt her heart skip a beat but said nothing.

The old woman turned to look her in the eyes. Her irises were as dark as onyx and her silver-streaked raven hair was braided down to her waist. She must have been very beautiful in her youth.

"Look," she said, "I've been around long enough to know that everyone wants what's best for Spira, Al Bhed or not. Yevon sent you all the way here for a reason. We may not understand it quite yet, but He has a plan for you."

"And how do you know that?" Hana retorted, followed by a bought of excruitating bout of coughs.

"Oh!" the woman exclaimed as she floated towards the exit, "I figured that you might need some fresh water, but I was hoping that you'd wake up first. The sea is more salt than water! Did you know that? No, not good at all."

'I don't care,' Hana thought, but didn't dare say outload. It wasn't the salt content of the ocean that brought her here, anyways. It was Sin: the son of a bitch himself. 'Does Sin have a plan for me too, then?' She sarcastically thought to herself, 'Kill me, maybe?'

The old woman quickly returned with a cup of water, clean bandages still in hand. She gravitated toward her cot, carefully unraveling the old, blood-soaked ones. Hana winced through the stinging pain and clamped her teeth down on her bottom lip. The woman cradled her head as she spun the cloth around Hana's skull, which was both comforting and excruciating at the same time.

The old woman grasped her chin and lifted it upwards while she gently poured the cold water into her mouth. Hana couldn't remember the last time she had such fresh water. She didn't even know how long she had laid unconscious in this random tent, the random town, so far from Home.

"My dear," she said, "I've been a healer in Besaid for over forty years. I believe that no matter who we are or where we came from, that we are all children of Yevon. The others on the other hand, they might not be so kind to you."

Others? Cid! "Where there any others that washed up like me?" Hana asked.

The old woman paused and gazed at the floor. She sighed and whispered, "Yes. There were many more that washed up on shore that day."

"Where are they?" She shouted.

The woman gazed off into the distance and put her hands over her heart. "They are in a hut across the way. We are waiting for the summoners from Bevelle to tend to them."

"Let me see." Hana demanded.

The old woman shook her head. "We must respect the summoners and the friends and families who have just lost someone."

"What about me? I came out to sea with my brother! Where is he? Is he here? Is he in that hut?" Hana desperately screamed.

"Now, now" the old woman said softly, "I think you need to rest and thank Yevon that you're still with us. You've been badly injured."

Hana's cheeks grew hot was anger. Her adrenaline overrode her pain and she sprung up from her cot to run outside. It almost insulted her how beautiful Besaid looked on that day: the smell of the ocean breeze tickled her nose and ruffled the palm trees. The sun shone down on all the singing birds. 'How dare they sing on a day like this?' Hana fumed.

The purple hut stood across the cobblestone pathway, and she wasted no time to barge in. There, stood nine cots and nine figures. She froze and her anger melted into sadness. Embroidered cloths of yellow, purple, and blue concealed the face of each and every one- and each and every one laid motionless. Not a wiggled toe, no rising and falling of any chests, no noise or movement of any kind.

Almost afraid to breathe, she saw three male bodies and slowly made her way towards them. She peered under the cloth over one. His blue eyes were clouded over and his mouth agape in a permanent expression of horror- but he wasn't Cid. She closed his eyelids for him and moved to the next one- a dark man with a black beard, bald head, and an old scar stretching from his ear to his mouth. Not her brother, either, but at least he looked peaceful. She creeped, at a snails pace, to the next one. The last one. Her heart sank as she lifted the cloth to reveal an auburn-haired man, his brown, cloudy eyes staring at nothing.

She fell to the floor and sobbed. She pictured her poor brother, trapped in the cabin as it rapidly filled with water. She pictured him clawing at the walls until his fingernails bled, screaming for help. She wasn't there and now he was in a watery grave all alone. She should have listened to him when he told her to get inside. Even though she was born a mere three minutes earlier than him, it was her job as an older sister to be there. They were born together and they should have died together, too. She beat her fists on the floor. She failed him.

Suddenly, the curtains at the entrance ruffled and a man's voice bellowed at her, "What do you think you're doing in here?"

"My brother," she sobbed, "He's not here."

She looked up at him with blurry eyes. He was tall and young, maybe in his late twenties, dressed in an orange and red priest robe. He held his chin up high as he glared down at her with his icy blue eyes. 'Conceited prick', Hana thought to herself.

"Even so," the man spat, "Miss Prija is supposed to be looking after you right now. Go see her. Yevon knows your machina caused this mess in the first place!"

Hana sniffled. "Miss Prija?"

The man snarled in disgust. "Where do you think you've been staying? Do they not have manners where you're from? Show some respect to the woman who saved your life, for Yevons sake! If it were up to me, I would have left you heathen right on the beach."

Hana fantasized about clocking him a good one as she slowly rose to her feet. Her head began pounding again and her knees wobbled. 'He's lucky I'm not in good shape', she thought to herself as she made her way back to Miss Prija's hut.

Someone told her, when she was a child, that it's always rainy when you lose someone that you love. It was sunny and beautiful when she lost her grandmother, and now with her brother gone, it was a mild sunny day in Besaid with a gentle breeze that wafted over the scent of the ocean. Bullshit, all of it.

She laid back down on her cot, hugging her knees to her chest while she wiped away her tears. Maybe she should have dragged him out on the deck with her so they would both be in Besaid. Maybe she should have faked the flu so they wouldn't have gone at all. Some stupid airship at the bottom of the ocean wasn't worth all of this.

"We've all lost something. We've all lost someone. It brings us together, doesn't it?" Miss Prija said as she brushed a stray blonde ringlet from Hana's forehead.

"Don't worry about the younger ones, really," she continued, "Most of them don't have the life experience to see the whole picture. You're safe here."

Hana said nothing. She was angry and devastated. She had been the stupid one by running out on the deck in the middle of a storm. He was the smart one by staying inside the cabin. Why, then, was she alive and him dead? The universe must be playing tricks on her. If Yevon was real, he fucking hated her.

"I know it's tough, dear," Miss Prija said, "But you must keep your strength up. You need to eat. The summoners should be arriving tomorrow."

"I'm not hungry," Hana sniffled.

Still, she presented Hana with a bowl of white rice topped with pickled mangoes. She forced it into her hands without saying a word before leaving the hut, not giving Hana the chance to refuse.

Her stomach roared. Maybe she was hungry, after all. She dreamed of the food back Home: crunchy almond cookies, garlic butter potatoes, and pasta with cream sauce and oysters. She'd never had pickled mangoes before but they looked delicious.

As she began to eat, she pondered how long she would have to stay here and how the hell she was supposed to get back Home. And when she did get there, what would she say? "Hi mom and dad, your son is dead and it's all my fault?"

She made sure to scoop every last grain of rice into her mouth before setting the bowl aside. She curled into her cotton robe, rubbing the tips of her fingers along the soft fabric on her sleeve. It comforted her, for now.

The summoners, the human lemmings hurdling towards an imaginary cliff, were coming. She had been told stories of a sending before, in which a summoner sends "souls" to the farplane to rest, but she had never seen one in person. It frightened her. They weren't the departed themselves after all, rather, they were personofied memories of them to entertain the living. 'All of us have memories for a reason,' she thought, 'and they should stay that way.'

She shuddered at the thought of Cid's body washing up somewhere and some stranger performing a sending on it. As morbid as it may be, Hana thought he was better off at the bottom of the sea to feed the fish: it was the circle of life, after all. And the circle of life, albeit heartbreaking and vicious at times, was beautiful. All the beings in Spira would work together, if we would just let them.

She rested her aching head and reminisced about him. About the time he ate her share of treats their grandmother gifted them and about the time their father taught them how to steer a ship near the shores of Bikanel.

Back then, she was jealous that Cid caught on better than her. He always drove on their excursions from then on. What could she do? It was his passion. Was.


	3. Chapter 3

"Hey!" Miss Prija shouted, "Wake up! The summoners are here!"

Hana moaned and tried to cover her eyes with her face, but they were snatched away. She could feel that the air was cold and damp, meaning that it was still quite early. Why did they have to come at this hour?

Miss Prija lifted her to a sitting position and began unraveling the bandages around her head. They felt dry. "My," she crooned, "You heal rather quick. This might be the last roll that I'm going to have to use on you."

Once again, she wrapped a clean bandage around Hana's head as she yawned and rubbed her eyes. "Why do I have to be there during the sending," she asked, "when I don't have anything to do with it?"

"Mind your manners!" Miss Prija snapped, "You need to pay your respects. The locals here already hate you for what you are. Do you want them to hate you for who you are as well?"

"That's fair," Hana replied, glancing at a dress neatly folded on top of her wetsuit. "Is that for me?"

"Yes," Miss Prija said as she finished wrapping the bandage, "Unless you feel like attending in a house robe?"

"I don't."

"Very well," Miss Prija replied as she wobbled near the exit, "Come out when you're dressed."

Hana buried her hands in her face. She was nervous, excited, and angry all at the same time: nervous because she was an Al Bhed on Yevonite territory, excited because she had never witnessed a sending, and angry that the sending was taking place at all.

She picked up the scarlet-coloured dress and held it out in front of her. It had gold trim on the bottom hem and sleeves, and although she had never had a taste for feminine clothing, she had to admit that it looked lovely. 'Too bad I'm going to ruin the image with my beat up head', she laughed to herself.

She disrobed and threw the dress over her head, minding her head wound. She was surprised that it fit like a second skin. It was always difficult finding clothing that fit her tiny frame. Her mother found it easier to make Hana's clothing herself, even still now that she was nineteen.

Outside, a group of twenty-something conglomerated around the hut of the deceased. It was easy to tell who the summoners were by their long, vibrant robes. She counted three. One draped in cyan blue and silver, one draped in violet and gold, and the other draped in olive green and copper. She wondered if the colours symbolized anything.

She stepped barefoot onto the cold, dewy grass towards the solemn group. She was careful to not stand so close, but not too far away lest the others think that she's being disrespectful. She saw a small auburn-haired boy, no more than seven years old, clutch his mother's leg and cry out for his father. The father with the cloudy eyes that looked at nothing. It made her feel as if a wooden stake was driven into her heart a million times over. 'Spira,' she thought, 'A perfect name for the spiral of death.'

In fluid motion, the summoner in the olive green and gold robe ordered everyone to give him space as he swung his rod like a pendulum at his feet. Hana was entranced by his baritone voice. It was one of those voices that you heard and obeyed without question. It was calm, but deep and commanding.

The group backed away about ten feet as the summoner twirled the golden, beaded rod above his head. Hana's eyes were stuck on him like butterfly wings pinned to a corkboard. He pirouetted and swung his rod around him with his arm outstretched. Just then, little orbs of blue and purple began to emit from the hut. Mesmerized, she watched their translucent rainbow tails swaying in the wind as they disappeared into the sky towards the farplane.

She heard the townspeople gasp- or maybe sighs of relief? An elderly man fell to his knees and prayed, "Praise be to Yevon, praise be to Yevon" over and over again under his raspy breath. It creeped her out. The little auburn-haired boy was now cradled in his mother's arms, both sobbing as they walked away. She saw Miss Prija perform the prayer, forming her hands as if she were holding an invisible orb, but she could not bring herself to follow suit.

She needed to get away, now. The air seemed thick and heavy from the occasion, making Hana's breaths too short. She felt dizzy. She felt hot. She felt overwhelmed. But where to go? Barefoot, she ran towards the sound of the ocean, down a sandy path. She barely felt the stray rocks jabbing into her soles. The beats of her steps seemed to cry 'he's dead, he's dead, he's dead'.

She arrived at the shore and kicked the water. "Fuck you!" She screamed at it, wishing that it could somehow feel pain. "Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you!"

"You shouldn't get so angry with such an injury." A baritone voice behind her calmly said, "You should rest."

It was one of the summoners. The one in cyan and silver. He walked toward her and knelt in the sand.

"Why did you follow me?" She spat.

"A young woman with a bandaged head, running away all by herself? Why would I not?" He replied, his cobalt eyes fixed on the horizon.

"You don't know me."

"I don't need to."

'The nerve of this guy,' Hana thought to herself. She stared at him hard, with the same stare that her father told her could make someone burst into flames. His chestnut hair brushed against his high cheekbones as the wind hit his face. 'At least he's cute, I guess.'

She sat next to him and fixated on the teal water lapping up on the sand. "So, then," she said, "You're a summoner."

He nodded. "And you hate that."

Her eyes burned with tears.

"I just don't get it!" She said, "If I have a coffee mug that I use for years, and then I drop it and it breaks, it makes all the times I've used it more valuable. Sending souls to the farplane like you do, it- it takes away from our experiences. It cheapens them."

He stayed silent as he continued to admire the horizon. He even smiled a little bit, the bastard.

"What the fuck is wrong with you!" She screamed as she shook his shoulder. Still, he said nothing. She began to beat her tiny fists on his back. "How can you smile at a time like this?"

He grabbed her wrists and pulled her head into his lap. He twirled her blonde ringlets in his fingers as he shushed her. She felt her body grow heavy and exhausted.

"My brother is dead," she cried softly, "And my poor parents probably think that I'm dead, too."

"Both of my parents are dead," he replied, "I think it's quite beautiful how loss brings everyone together, no matter who they are or where they came from."

"It's terrible."

"But necessary."

She buried her face in his robe and took a few deep breaths. Maybe this guy wasn't so terrible, after all. Just brainwashed.

"Your brother, did you see him in that hut?" he asked.

"No. We were at sea. I woke up here."

"I had a feeling that was the case," he said while he brushed his hand against her cheek, "We are going to Kilika tomorrow to perform a sending. Perhaps your brother will be there and you could get some closure."

She sobbed into his robe and thought about yelling at him some more, about telling him that she would rather Cid be eaten by fish.

"You do know that-" she began.

"You're Al Bhed," he interrupted, "I don't care about that. Why don't we go back into the village to rest? We leave in the morning."

He rose, holding Hana up by the waist. Even though she hated feeling weak, his warm shoulder comforted her.

"Hana," she whispered.

"Braska," he said back.


End file.
